Disposable absorbent garments, such as diapers, incontinence garments, and the like, have become popular because of their effectiveness in absorbing body exudates and because of their convenience. Considerable effort, however, has been expended to improve the absorbency characteristics of the garment. For example, elasticized legbands have been employed to reduce leakage from the garment crotch area. Various conventional types of elastic legband configurations are shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,860,003 issued Jan. 14, 1975 to K. Buell; U.S. Pat. No. 4,050,462 issued Sept. 27, 1977 to L. S. Woon, et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 4,388,075 issued June 14, 1983 to F. Mesek, et al.; and U.S. Pat. 4,326,528 issued Apr. 27, 1982 to L. Ryan.
Elasticized waistbands have also been employed to further improve that appearance and effectiveness of a disposable absorbent garment. For example, elasticized waistbands are described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,245,407 issued Apr. 12, 1966 to A. Mason and U.S. Pat. No. 4,515,595 issued May 7, 1985 to D. Kievit.
Conventional absorbent garments have also included contoured absorbent pads in which greater amounts of absorbent material have been selectively located in those "target" areas that receive greater quantities of body exudates. Examples of contoured, absorbent pads are shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,388,056 issued July 14, 1983 to F. Lee, et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 3,682,761 issued Aug. 8, 1972 to C. Lee, et al.; and U.S. Pat. No. 3,973,291 issued Aug. 10, 1976 to C. Kolbach.
The absorbent pads employed with disposable, absorbent garments have been selectively configured with perforations or apertures to help direct liquids away from the body of the wearer and into the absorbent material. Examples of perforated or apertured absorbent pads are described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,441,024 issued Apr. 29, 1969 to H. Ralph; U.S. Pat. No. 3,749,627 issued July 31, 1973 to J. Jones, Sr.; U.S. Pat. No. 3,889,679 issued July 17, 1975 to G. Taylor; and U.S. Pat. No. 3,927,673 issued Dec. 23, 1975 to G. Taylor.
Conventional disposable, absorbent garment designs, such as those described above, have not been completely satisfactory. The amount of absorbent material that can be located within the garment crotch section is limited because of the restricted, narrow space between the wearer's legs. In addition, the effectiveness of the conventional disposable garment with regard to containing body exudates has not been completely satisfactory. Discharges of the exudates have not been readily absorbed or contained by the absorbent garment, and as a result, the exudates, particularly feces, can undesirably leak out and soil the outer clothes of the wearer. A factor which contributes to the undesired leakage of fecal matter is that high absorbency garments containing relatively large amounts of absorbent material have not been readily conformable to the body shape of the wearer because of the bulk, stiffness and shape of the absorbent pads. As a result, body exudates can undesirably migrate and leak past the elasticized legbands before the exudates can be absorbed or otherwise contained by the absorbent material in the garment.